FSMTB Releases Model Practice Act

The Federation of State Massage Therapy Boardsreleased the Model Practice Act a few days ago, just after the third anniversary of the announcement they had formed a Task Force of 8 state board members to work on it. I just had the time to read it in its entirety today, and as a former state board member and former delegate to the Federation myself, I appreciate the huge amount of time and effort that went into it.

I didn’t find much that surprised me. Last week when this was first released, I saw some rumblings from educators and school owners about the requirement for massage therapy programs to be 625 hours. As the publication says, it is consistent with the 625-hour recommendation of the recently-released ELAP (Entry-Level Analysis Project) that was a collaborative effort supported by all of the national massage organizations. Since there are currently more than two dozen states that still have 500 hours as their entry-level requirement, that’s going to require some major changes. Many smaller schools would probably go out of business rather than comply with the change.

The document does not state the name of the NCBTMB or any other entity’s exam in the context of eliminating them, but the definition of “examination” is given as a standardized test or examination of entry-level massage and bodywork knowledge, skills, and abilities that is developed and administered by the Federation of State Massage Therapy Boards. That means the MBLEx, period. About 40 states are currently accepting both the MBLEx and the NCB’s licensing exams. There are also a couple of states that have their own exam–and require much more than 625 hours. I don’t see that those states will want to back up and adopt this.

The MPA does seem to support portability in a good way. There are provisions for therapists participating in planned out-of-state events, temporary assignments such as with traveling sports teams, etc.,and emergency response disaster teams without requiring jumping through hoops. It would also seek to make the title of each state’s act the _____Massage Therapy Practice Act, leaving the term “bodywork” and any other terminology out of it. Licensees would be designated “LMT” (Licensed Massage Therapist) uniformly across the states.

One thing that I was not crazy about was the protocol for choosing board members. The MPA states that 7 members are to be appointed by the governor. I would prefer to see that power spread around a little. I wouldn’t want to see governors of any political party appointing only the people for their own party, for example. In my state, the appointees are made by the governor, the speaker of the house, and the senate pro tem. I think that or something similar is a little better balance of power, personally; even if they do randomly turn out to all have the same party affiliation.

I also wondered about the discrepancy in defining “clock hour” as 50 minutes of instruction and “contact hour” as 60 minutes of instruction. The NCBTMB has traditionally allowed 50 minutes of instruction as a contact hour for the purpose of continuing education.

The states are also still left with more autonomy than I expected. There’s plenty left in their hands, so to speak, with the usual statements about how the board may adopt, amend, and repeal rules. There is also a licensure by endorsement stipulation and a grandfathering accommodation.

There are only five states left without licensing. It would certainly be to their advantage to have this right out of the gate and avoid having to reinvent the wheel. As for the other 45 states that are already regulated, I don’t see that there will be a mad rush to adopt this, unless what they currently have isn’t working for some reason. We have to remember that the FSMTB is not a regulatory body in and of itself, but a coalition of regulated states. They can’t force the MPA on any state, nor are they trying to. It is a blueprint, a collection of suggestions for how to make the states more uniform in the regulation of massage. Too bad it didn’t exist a few decades ago before most of the states got on the bandwagon.

I don’t have any harsh criticisms of the document. Personally, I like the concept of raising the minimum requirement to 625 hours, but then again, I’m not a school owner that would be affected by such a thing. My final analysis: kudos to the people that worked on it. Things like this that are done by volunteers always come under a rash of criticism from people who disagree with the product.

8 thoughts on “FSMTB Releases Model Practice Act”

Even though my state only requires 500, the leading schools are offering far more. I don’t see any reputable school having a problem increasing the hours of their program, heck, they’ll just charge more. But next we need to focus on quality of instruction and not just hours…. we need our instructors to be regulated as well!

Really love the idea of all states being more uniform in the regulation of massage and all massage therapists being licensed massage therapists rather than certified or registered massage therapists. .

As a member of my school’s Advisory Board, I was pleased that they raised the hours to 900. Ohio has a minimum of 750 hours. There is so much to learn. I am a big fan of continuing ed. However, having the grads better prepared will improve their chances at succeeding as an MT and ensure better treatment for their patients right out of school.

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